The Afternoon of the Day
by CrlkSeasons
Summary: Whether happy or sad, each new beginning comes in a package with an ending. A story set in the twilight of the timeline that was changed in Endgame.


Written for VAMB's Secret Summer. RSB requested a Tom/Miral story. Fluff or angst at writer's discretion. Bonus points for P/T.

I decided to touch as many of the bases as I could.

 **The Afternoon of the Day**

In a darkened canyon two figures pressed in close behind the inadequate protection offered by modest projections in the rock face. Rapacious vultures circled above, anticipating a feast.

Suddenly a photon pistol barked. White-hot flame shot out and melted rock mere millimeters from Captain Proton's head.

Proton didn't flinch. He didn't even blink. He knew the near miss was a lucky shot. General Vile's aim was notoriously bad. It was safer to stay put until the general's energy cartridge ran out. Proton could then simply knock the weapon out of the general's hand and accept his surrender.

One final flame limped, sizzled and died. Captain Proton was beginning a suitably scornful speech when his image on the monitor wavered and the program shut down.

Tom Paris frowned. It shouldn't do that. He'd beefed up the energy lattice when he set up the link from his studio to the cabin. He was facing a publisher's deadline for the latest installment in his _Captain Proton and the Universe_ series. But his daughter, Miral, had been given a rare three week leave. Tom wanted to spend as much time with her at the cabin as possible.

Tom fiddled with the program settings. It wasn't hard to track down the problem. He'd been trying out some new ideas. Predictability was so boring. There was nothing worse than hearing his public say that they'd foreseen one of his story twists. The multiple outcomes that branched out from this point in the story required even more energy than he'd calculated.

Tom sat back in his chair. He could fix the problem himself. He had the necessary skills. His time on Voyager had given him years of practical engineering experience. But doing that would waste a perfectly good opportunity to corral B'Elanna into checking out his latest holoprogram. She'd never admit that she was at all curious to see what he'd come up with this time.

Tom smiled to himself and shut down the controls. He stretched in order to work out a crick in his neck and strolled to the window. The sun had worked its way around to this side of the cabin. The view through a break in the trees looked down on the sun-sparkled water of a quiet cove. Most visitors preferred the more impressive ocean view visible from the rustic porch along the front of the cabin. But a short sandy beach nestled in the cove held a special place in Tom's heart.

Tom checked the chronometer. B'Elanna and Miral should be back from their errand in town any minute now.

Right on cue Tom heard the front door open to a bustle of animated voices heavily laden with packages. He found his empty mug and went to join his wife and daughter.

"Uh oh," Tom muttered to himself when he caught the tone of the voices coming from the living area. He tried to assess the seriousness of the disagreement. Two Klingons, even a quarter and a half Klingon, could make a civil difference of opinion sound like a full-blown argument between two Humans.

"I can't talk to you about this, Mom. I'm going for a walk."

After another flurry of sound, the ensuing quiet confirmed that Miral had left.

Tom strategically held position. When he did enter the living area B'Elanna was standing with her back to him, staring out at the ocean. Tom casually strolled across to the old fashioned kitchen. He'd learned long ago not to force a confidence from her before she was ready. He replenished his own mug and poured a coffee for B'Elanna.

Tom came up behind B'Elanna. She didn't turn or speak. He placed the two mugs on the window ledge where she could see them. He folded his arms around her and waited.

"Difference of opinion?" he asked mildly.

"We _weren't_ arguing." She defended herself against a charge remembered more from her youth than from anything that Tom said. "We were exchanging views in a forcibly direct manner," she informed him.

"Uh huh," he agreed.

B'Elanna leaned back against her husband. Finally, she turned to face him. "Miral's leave has been cut short."

B'Elanna searched Tom's face anxiously. She knew how much he'd looked forward to spending time with Miral at the cabin. The two of them loved it here so much.

"What do you mean?" Tom's first reaction was puzzlement. "Admiral Janeway cleared the schedule so that Miral could have this time with us."

"Admiral Janeway," B'Elanna informed him dryly, "just cancelled Miral's leave."

Tom blinked and took time to choose his words carefully. He didn't want to say anything that would make B'Elanna feel worse than she obviously did. Besides, as disappointing as the news was it wasn't something that should make B'Elanna this upset. There had to be more.

"That _is_ too bad. But what's going on that you haven't told me about yet?"

"I don't _know_ what's going on. I wish I did. I have a feeling that the Admiral's up to something and she's thrust Miral right into the middle of it."

"That happens when you're a Starfleet officer," Tom pointed out.

"This is different. The Admiral has set some kind of pet project of her own in motion. She's been asking me odd questions about politics on Qo'noS. I have a feeling that she's going to ask me to pull some strings there. She knows I'll do it. I'm just not sure I like the idea of our daughter being caught up in it, whatever it is."

B'Elanna picked up her coffee mug and took a sip. "Something about this doesn't sit right, Tom."

Tom stared at his own coffee, considering his options. "You know," he decided, "all this coffee isn't good for me. Some fresh air would be a lot better. I think I'll take a walk." He gave B'Elanna a hug. "Will you be okay, starting dinner without me?"

B'Elanna returned his hug with her own energy. "I won't burn it before you get back, if that's what you mean." Then she smiled at him softly. "Miral took the long way round. If you take the short cut, you'll make it to the cove before she gets there."

Tom smiled ruefully. His wife knew him so well. Not only that, every day made her even more attractive to him. The duskier hue that most Klingon skin acquired over time added to the exotic quality of her beauty. He was a lucky man. He kissed her gently, thankfully. Then he headed out the door.

Outside, Tom took the steps at the side of the porch and worked his way around to the head of the trail down to the cove. Although oceanfront property in private hands was a rarity, this land had been in the Paris family for generations. Tom's sisters had been happy to resolve estate issues by signing the cabin over to him. They were more concerned about the main family property now that their mother had relocated to the apartment in the city.

Tom brushed an overly inquisitive insect away from his forehead. His gradually receding hairline had finally taken a stand. A few hundred years ago, when people on Earth were obsessed with so-called physical perfection, he might have done something about his hair. That kind of obsession disappeared from Earth along with other oddities like the currency-based economy. It wasn't important anymore.

B'Elanna's opinion was the only other one that mattered to Tom. She just growled and said that he should watch his step on Qo'noS. Some of her female Klingon cousins were getting ideas now that he had a forehead worthy of a Klingon warrior.

Tom stopped partway down the hill. At this point the trail opened up and he had a clear view of the whole cove. The tide was coming in, swirling lazily around three granite rocks that formed steppingstones across to a wide rocky ledge. It had been one of Tom's favorite thinking places ever since he was a boy.

Tom timed his walk well. When he reached the ledge he could see Miral working her way around the headland path. He sat down on the smooth, sun-warmed rock, letting his feet dangle freely over the edge, taking in the fresh salt air.

He waited until she was sitting comfortably beside him before he spoke. "So, how's it going, Munchkin?"

"Dad! Do you have to use that old baby name? I'm a grown woman now, and a Starfleet officer too."

"My mistake. I keep forgetting. How's it going, Ensign Munchkin?"

She wrinkled her nose, then gave up and laughed.

"How soon do you have to leave?" Tom asked.

"Tomorrow, right after breakfast."

Tom winced. That was even earlier than he'd feared.

Miral caught his expression. "Mom isn't happy about it either."

"You know she's not upset with _you_ , right?"

Miral squeezed his arm reassuringly. "I know. It's Starfleet she's annoyed with. After all these years she still says 'Starfleet' like she's scraping chewing gum from the bottom of her shoe in your old movie theater program."

Tom laughed. "Your mother is a woman of strong convictions." Then he sobered. "Will you have to miss the reunion too? It's the first time in four years that Uncle Harry can be there."

"I don't know."

"Don't know or can't say?"

"Dad …"

"I know! I know. Starfleet protocol."

Miral slipped her arm through his. "I hope I can make it. I love watching you work the room."

Tom looked down at what he could see of her face. "What do you mean?" he asked.

Miral smiled up at him. "You get more of the latest news in five minutes of saying 'hello' than I get in four hours." She added in a confidential whisper, "That's why you come down here instead of Mom."

Tom smiled at his grown-up daughter, still disconcertingly sharp-eyed and even more knowing than when she was a child.

Miral made herself comfortable again. "But you know what I like best of all at the reunion parties?"

"What?"

"The way you and Mom connect even when you are on opposite ends of the room. Watching the two of you, separate but in tune. It's almost eerie. You instinctively know when one of you needs the other. You can be deep in conversation with other people. Something happens. I barely have time to turn around and you and Mom are together, talking without saying a word." Miral sighed. "When I can have _that_ with someone, I'll know that I've found the right person for me."

"You'll have it someday. I know you will. Although _that_ comes after years of working at a relationship." He hadn't missed the nose wrinkle, so he added, "Like _anything_ else worth having, a good marriage takes hard work."

"Is that your way of making me feel better about still being an ensign even though I'm almost twenty-six?"

"You'll get that extra pip," Tom assured her. "You're too good an officer not to make lieutenant one day soon."

"It's not so much the rank," she explained. "It's getting stuck with these low level assignments."

Tom nodded in sympathy. "They won't go to waste. You'll see. In the long run they'll make you a better officer. I know I understood more about being a senior officer after I had to work so hard to get my lieutenant pip back."

"Do you miss it, Dad?"

"What? Being a Starfleet officer? No. It was the right decision for us to leave." Your mother and I didn't lose anything that really matters to us."

"I don't mean about Starfleet. I mean what it was like on Voyager. After Tuvok's condition worsened, you were third in command. There were many times when you were effectively in charge of the ship. After that, all this has to feel pretty tame."

Tom chuckled. "Captain Proton tame? My programming skills must be slipping."

Some things never changed. Miral didn't let his attempted diversion distract her from her question.

Tom sighed. "If things had been different when we got back – maybe. But I learned a long time ago not to waste the future stuck in a past that I can't change. Why do you ask?"

"Oh, I just wondered."

People usually compared Miral with B'Elanna. But she was her father's daughter too. It was Tom's turn not to be pushed off his question. "You wouldn't ask without a reason."

"I wondered what it would be like for me not to be in Starfleet."

"Are you considering a career change?" Tom asked carefully, trying not to probe beyond her comfort level.

Miral bit her lip. "Not really. Though if this mission ends up the way I think it might, I may not have a choice." She shook her head. "I wish I could tell you more. There's not much I'm allowed to say."

Tom nodded. Civilian or not, he understood. B'Elanna shed Starfleet like a ghiq shucking off a too tight layer of old skin that itched and chaffed. Starfleet was bred in Tom's bones. "Well, we _could_ spend a couple of hours playing twenty questions," he said. "Why don't you just tell me what you _can_ say?"

Miral frowned. "I keep asking questions and not getting answers."

"That's not so unusual for a junior officer. What's different this time?"

"I'm not the only one asking questions. No one else is getting answers either. Admiral Janeway is keeping a really tight lid on the project. I don't like the way the pieces I do have fit together. I'm not sure I agree with where this is heading."

"Are you saying that you don't trust the Admiral's judgment?"

Miral shook her head. "I grew up trusting her judgment. I'm so used to following her orders that it's second nature. I'm worried that if a time comes when I should disobey her orders, I won't be able to do it."

"That is a big one!" Tom commented. "Are you there right now?"

"Not yet. But if I do get there, how will I know what's the right thing to do?"

Tom studied her closely, reading even more between the lines. He understood this kind of dilemma better than most. Tom shifted so he could face his daughter and took her hand. "Okay. For what it's worth, here's my two-cent speech. Starfleet has a chain of command for a reason. Senior officers get to make really tough decisions. By all means, ask your questions, offer suggestions, raise alternatives."

Tom considered his next words carefully. "In the end, senior officers won't always make the decisions that you or I would make. They don't always make the best ones. You don't have to agree with every decision a commanding officer makes. But once that decision is made, you do have to follow orders and do the best job you can."

"However…" Tom frowned at the memory of a younger version of himself. "However," he repeated, "if a time ever comes when following an order means that you can't live with yourself afterwards - then go with what your conscience tells you to do. Others may not agree with you. You certainly won't get any thanks. You _will_ face consequences up to and including being kicked out of Starfleet. But you can live without Starfleet. You can't live without your conscience."

Miral didn't respond for a while. Then she grimaced. "I _wanted_ bigger challenges. I guess I should be careful what I wish for."

Tom rubbed the side of his chin. "That's what your mother says."

Miral moved back closer to Tom. He shifted to accommodate her. She swung her legs over the water. Father and daughter sat side by side, suspended partway between sea and sky. Finally Miral leaned up and kissed Tom on the cheek. "Thanks, Dad." She rested her head on his shoulder. "I miss this place. I'm sorry I can't stay."

Tom carefully pulled his arm free and slipped it around her shoulder. "Well, if tonight is all we have left, let's make the most of it. And how about I make banana pancakes for breakfast tomorrow?"

"From scratch?" she asked hopefully. Miral was her mother's daughter in more ways than one.

"From scratch," he agreed.

She kissed his cheek again. "I'm going back to the cabin to talk to Mom. Give us a few minutes before you come up."

"You got it," he assured her.

Tom watched his daughter climb the path. He had a strange sense of loss as the trail took her farther and farther away from him. The white of Miral's tunic blinked in and out under the dark green of the tree branches. It was as if she was flickering in and out of existence like his holographic Captain Proton earlier in the day.

Despite the lingering warmth of the sun, the evening breeze brought an unseasonal chill to the air around Tom.


End file.
